


First Responder

by tj_teejay



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, h/c
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-23
Updated: 2015-06-23
Packaged: 2018-04-05 18:32:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4190520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tj_teejay/pseuds/tj_teejay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Foggy never dreamed of having to be first responder to a badly battered Matt Murdock lying on his own couch, but when Claire isn’t available, who else is there to call for help?</p>
            </blockquote>





	First Responder

**Author's Note:**

> **WARNING:** This contains pretty graphic descriptions of bodily injuries. If you have an issue with medical squick, this probably isn’t for you.  
>  **Time Frame:** This takes place some time in the space of episode 13 after Foggy and Matt make up and before Matt gets the new Daredevil suit. Not sure that really fits with canon, so just indulge me, okay? :-)  
>  **Author's Note:** Not sorry to be posting more Matt!whump. Those who know me know that h/c is my go-to genre. In any fandom. Especially the ones where regular whump is pretty much canon.  
>  Written for the following [Daredevil Kinkmeme prompt](https://daredevilkink.dreamwidth.org/725.html?thread=676053#cmt676053): After another night of vigilanting Matt comes to Foggy (Claire is out of town or something). Foggy patches him and he's so gentle and kind Matt gets overwhelmed and starts quietly crying. Foggy comforts him. Yes, I may have a thing for crying Matt.  
> 
> 
> +-+-+-+-+

Foggy isn’t very good at this. His aunt Maggie is a nurse, and he’s always admired her for it. In terms of treating medical conditions, Foggy has terrible skills and an even more terrible tolerance for gore.

Yet, here he is, in Matt’s apartment, with his best friend on the couch, bleeding and injured in more than once place. Foggy’s gaze gets caught on the discarded black, woolen mask on the floor, but a pained moan from Matt brings his attention back to the matter at hand.

“Jesus, Matt. I... I don’t even know where to start.”

“First aid kit in the kitchen cupboard,” he forces out through clenched teeth.

Foggy obediently goes to get it. “Shouldn’t we call Claire or something?”

“Tried. She’s not answering.”

“I mean, I’m honored and everything, but I’m _really_ not the person you should be calling at 1 AM when you’re bleeding half to death. You belong in a hospital. You know, with proper medical equipment, and people who know what they’re doing.”

“Don’t need a hospital,” Matt says between breaths.

“Yeah, forgive me if I don’t trust your judgment on this.”

“Give it a rest and get to work. Start with the cut on my head. Is it still bleeding?”

Foggy closes his eyes, like he thinks maybe it’s just a bad dream he can wake from. To no avail. He opens them, and Matt is still here, and he’s still as battered and bruised as before.

“Let me see,” he says as he dons a set of nitrile gloves he finds in the first aid kit. He leans closer to inspect the cut near Matt’s hairline, and, shit, it’s way too dark in here. “You need better lighting. There’s blood, and it’s messy. That’s all I can see.”

Matt makes a grimace. “Get a lamp. I do have them, you know.”

Foggy isn’t quite ready to acknowledge the attempt at humor. This isn’t the time. _So_ not the time.

He fetches the table lamp from the red metal cupboard in the corner. Luckily, the cord is long enough.

And, Jesus, the wound looks even worse now. Clumps of hair are clotted together by dried blood near Matt’s temple. It has run down the side of Matt’s face and neck in ugly crimson streaks. Foggy doesn’t dare touch it. He has to swallow against a sudden bout of nausea.

“Is it still bleeding?” Matt repeats.

“No, I... don’t think so.”

“Okay, good. Head wounds always bleed a lot. Don’t think it needs stitches. I can clean it up later. Calf next.”

Foggy moves the lamp, the cord only just stretching long enough. “Yeah, we, uh... kinda need to get you out of those pants for that.”

Matt shakes his head. “Later. Just cut them.”

“Okay.”

“Scissors are in—“

“The kitchen drawer, I know.”

The fabric around Matt’s calf is soaked through, sticky with blood. Foggy has had his share of scrapes and cuts as a kid, and tries to remember the pain. It’s funny how selective memory works, he muses, because he doesn’t quite succeed.

He isn’t sure how to go about this. He doesn’t want to move Matt too much, because it could, it _must_ hurt. He touches the black pants with careful fingers, finding a good angle to cut it apart along Matt’s leg without aggravating his injuries. He’s not sure he’s succeeding, but takes it as a good sign that Matt is staying quiet.

When he’s reached the knee, he folds the pant leg away. Matt bends the leg at an angle for Foggy to inspect the damage, and Foggy can hear it in his strained breath that it’s less than pleasant.

“Okay, this one is definitely still bleeding,” he says, watching the red liquid oozing from what looks like a gash caused by something spiky ripping Matt’s flesh apart.

“Clean it, then get one of the large gauze pads and put it on there. Wrap a bandage around it. That should stop the bleeding.”

Foggy breathes a silent sigh of relief, because for a moment he thought Matt would ask him to suture it. The sheer though of threading a needle through Matt’s skin makes him want to puke right here on the floor.

Yet, Foggy does what he’s told, or at least tries. He dabs the wound with saline soaked pads, not sure if he’s doing it right. Matt lets out a subdued hiss in the process that Foggy can’t help. There’s no easy way of doing this.

Foggy’s hand is shaking when he rips open the paper wrapper that holds the gauze pads. He lets it hover over Matt’s calf, unsure how to go about this.

“Foggy. Just do it,” Matt tells him, as if he knows exactly what Foggy is doing—or not doing. He probably actually _does_ know exactly what Foggy is doing. Matt’s super senses still confuse the hell out of Foggy.

“I’m afraid to hurt you.”

Matt lets out a sarcastic breath through his nose. “It’s already hurting.”

“Shit,” Foggy mutters, then very gently puts the gauze on Matt’s skin. Matt flinches ever so slightly but doesn’t utter a sound.

When he starts wrapping the bandage around Matt’s calf, Matt’s voice stops him for a moment. “No. It needs to be tighter.”

Foggy lets his eyes roll skyward for a moment, because, damn, this is hard enough. “I’m so not cut out for this.”

“You’re doing fine. Just wrap it tighter, there needs to be pressure on the wound.”

Foggy does, and the flinching becomes more pronounced. Foggy wants to stop, wants to call 911 right this very moment. But he doesn’t, because Matt’s head is resting with closed eyes against the armrest with jaws clenched, and he’s relying on his best friend, and Foggy can’t let him down.

He finds a piece of adhesive medical tape and affixes the end of the bandage as carefully as he can. “Please tell me there isn’t more of this.”

Matt stays quiet, breathes out a long breath. There is. Of course there is. Foggy doesn’t wait for an answer. “Okay. Just tell me where.”

“This one’s tricky.”

 _Please no,_ Foggy thinks. He isn’t sure how much more of this he can handle. “Where, Matt?”

“Left arm.”

Foggy’s already reaching over, but Matt recoils before Foggy’s even touched him. That stops Foggy in mid-motion. “What is it?”

“I dislocated my shoulder.”

Foggy’s eyes go wide, and it’s only now he’s noticing that Matt is cradling his left arm tightly to his chest. “You have a dislocated shoulder?”

“No,” Matt sighs. “Not anymore. Popped it back into the joint. Just hurts.”

Yeah. Like a motherfucker, Foggy can only imagine. This is just all kinds of wrong with a capital W as large as the Hollywood sign’s sixth letter. Foggy feels helpless. “What do you want me to do?”

“There’s a wound on the inside of my upper arm. Feels like there’s still something in it. Maybe glass. Gravel. I’m not sure.”

Foggy has no clue whatsoever how glass or gravel would even get in a spot like that. “Great,” he dryly comments.

“Yeah.”

Foggy lifts his arms. They hover awkwardly over Matt’s chest. Whatever he’s gonna do, it’s gonna cause pain. Lots of it. “I can’t do this.”

“Sorry to break it to you, buddy, but you have to.”

“Stop joking, this isn’t funny.”

Matt lets out a cynical chuckle, which dissolves into a pained moan. “Yeah, try to be the one with the busted shoulder.”

“Seriously, I can’t do this, and I haven’t even touched your arm.”

Matt’s face takes on a more serious expression. “I’d do it myself if I could.”

What he isn’t saying is, _“But you’re the only one here who can, so it’s on you, pal.”_

Foggy sucks in a long, unsteady breath. Matt’s brows are already knitted together in anticipation of the onslaught to come. Then Foggy has an idea.

“You should take a painkiller, at least. Dull it down first.”

“No. That’ll take too long. Just get it over with.”

Foggy doesn’t want to. Really doesn’t want to. “Okay,” he says shakily, “Okay. You ready?”

“Not really, but do it anyway.”

“Shit,” Foggy broken-records under his breath, then lightly touches Matt’s left hand. He lifts it ever so slightly, and Matt’s already wincing. But he can’t stop now, shouldn’t stop. He gradually, slowly pulls, ignores Matt’s sharp hiss and lifts the arm further.

It’s when he starts rotating it to get to the inner side of Matt’s bicep that Matt let’s out something that’s dangerously close to a cry of pain. Foggy stops immediately. “I’m sorry,” he begs, and he is, even though none of this is his fault.

Matt’s face is contorted in pain, his eyes squeezed shut. Tears start to prickle at the corners of Foggy’s eyes, because seeing his friend like this is inhuman and torturous and just not something he ever wants to experience again.

“Keep going,” Matt eggs him on, the pain laced thickly through his voice. He adds a low, “Please,” for good measure, and a tear dislodges from Foggy’s eye. He quickly wipes it away and keeps going, as gently as he can.

It feels like an eternity of agony and ache and torment, but he can finally reach the inside of Matt’s upper arm. He awkwardly reaches over to pull one of the sofa cushions closer. He rests Matt’s arm on it so that it stays in the position he needs.

Matt is breathing hard now, every muscle in his body taut. Foggy’s forehead is in furrows, because he wants to take some of that pain away. No, scratch that. _All_ of it.

“I’m sorry,” he mutters again. “I, uh, I need to cut your shirt sleeve too.”

Matt just nods almost imperceptibly.

Once Foggy has exposed the wound, he can see why Matt wanted it cleaned so badly. There’s large chunks of skin abraded by God knows what. Dirt and grit litters the bloody mess that used to be soft tissue and skin. It’s not deep, but it’s nasty. Foggy is past the nausea now.

“How bad is it?” Matt mumbles weakly when Foggy just sits there, staring at it.

“I’m not gonna lie. It’s a mess. How long can you keep your arm like that? It’s gonna take a while to clean.”

“However long it takes, Foggy.”

“Okay,” Foggy says, then repeats. “Okay. Let’s get this baby on the road, then.”

Matt’s mouth draws into the faintest of smiles. Gallows humor is a grim consolation in the small hours of the night.

A pair of tweezers and cotton swabs soaked in saline solution are Foggy’s instruments of choice this time. Every time Matt flinches, he wants to stop and just dope his friend up with the strongest painkiller he can find, but he keeps going. Baby steps. The last piece of gravel has to come out some time.

It seems like half an eternity until it does, and Foggy releases a breath he hadn’t even noticed he was holding. He lets his hand rest ever so lightly on Matt’s waist near his hip where he’s fairly sure he isn’t injured, just feeling the warmth of his body. He can sense Matt trembling under his touch.

“All right. I’m done,” he says just above a whisper.

“Gauze. Bandage.” That’s all that Matt can say, and Foggy hates those words. It means more sleeve cutting, more movement aggravating the shoulder joint, more pain. But they’ve come this far, he can just as well go the whole nine yards now.

Maybe both Matt and Foggy have gotten used to this, to a certain extent at least, because it’s not as hard as he thought it would be to wrap the stark white bandage around Matt’s arm. By the time that his arm rests protectively against Matt’s chest again, Foggy feels as spent as Matt looks.

He tries to make his voice sound hardy, but very probably fails when he asks, “What next?”

“That’s all of it,” Matt tells him, and it’s more like a bone-deep sigh of exhaustion.

“Okay,” Foggy replies, and his relief is immeasurable. “Best news I’ve had all night. And that says a lot.”

He thinks maybe Matt is trying to give him a smile, but he can’t be sure. He looks at his friend, and gets a blanket from the bedroom that he drapes over him as gingerly as he can. “You should get some rest. I can stay.”

“You don’t have to,” Matt says weakly with his eyes closed.

“I know. But you and I both know there’s no way I’m leaving you like this, buddy. Besides, there’s still the head wound. Might as well finish the job properly.”

“It’s fine, Foggy. I’ll take care of that in the morning.”

“Yeah, like hell you will. You’ll barely be able to move in the morning. Now shut up and let Nurse Franklin do his job. By the way, he’s the one with the appalling bedside manner and abysmal medical skills.”

“As bedside manners go, yours is pretty damn fantastic,” Matt quips, but Foggy thinks it might not even be a joke.

Foggy makes a brief detour into the bathroom to get a towel and a bowl with warm water. Careful not to touch Matt’s arm or torso, he starts washing away the caked blood from Matt’s face and neck. His strokes are tender, the movements precise. He knows Matt’s skin is more sensitive than normal people’s, and his nerve endings must be on fire already.

He’s careful not to get too close to the actual wound, even though he can now see that Matt was right. The cut is neither big nor deep. He doesn’t need Matt’s instructions to figure out that one of the suture strips will take care of this one.

He runs his thumb over the adhesive ends with gentle pressure to make them stick properly, wiping the last flecks of blood away with the cloth for good measure.

And then he looks closely, and something clenches around his heart when he can see a tear dislodging from Matt’s eye, and then another. He stops what he’s doing, a slight sense of embarrassment washing over him, cause, yeah, how fucking weird is this?

Matt’s good hand comes up and finds Foggy’s wrist. His fingers are cold at the tips but warmer near the joints. “Thank you,” he whispers, and his breath hitches ever so slightly.

“Yeah, don’t mention it.”

Then Matt’s arm slowly sinks down again, and Foggy lets his hand rest on Matt’s forearm. He squeezes it softly, not sure what else to say. Matt sniffles, the tears still flowing freely and silently for reasons Foggy can’t quite discern.

Foggy’s hand stays there until they stop, willing all the warmth and strength into the touch he can muster. And maybe it’s just his imagination, but he thinks he can feel Matt relaxing just a little, the muscles not quite so tense anymore.

When Matt has quieted, Foggy gives his arm a last squeeze and asks, “Do you need anything? Something to eat? Drink? You should drink something.”

Matt shakes his head.

“Okay. I’ll just let you rest, then.”

Matt’s eyes are still closed, and Foggy figures he’s already halfway between semi-consciousness and sleep, so he gingerly adjusts the blanket one last time before he gets up to give his friend some space.

There’s beer in the fridge, although he could use something a little stronger tonight. But he’s still wired, and his brain is buzzing with the last remnants of adrenaline that he knows he should hold on to before it all hits left, right, and center.

It’s all he can do to switch off the table lamp that still shines a cone of light on Matt, and sinks down in one of the armchairs that faces the couch. Even in the half-light from the billboard outside, he can see Matt’s chest is rising and falling in even movements.

As much as he hates Matt for the danger he continually puts himself in, he can’t help but admire his friend for his strength, his tenaciousness, his fearlessness. Foggy still finds it hard to see past Matt Murdock and at the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen underneath the best friend slash lawyer exterior, but there’s something there in the curve of his lips that is reminiscent of the kind of badassery that the Man in the Mask embodies.

And for the briefest of moments, Foggy is honest-to-God proud to have black-hooded Daredevil as his best friend in the world.


End file.
